Gunnison

Avalanche

Evan Ross · Feb 16, 2024 · Gunnison

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Observation photo 1Observation photo 2Observation photo 3Observation photo 4

Weather

A little bit of sun and visibility at times, otherwise mostly cloudy. Very light snowfall.

Snowpack

HST since early 2/14 was sitting at 8" near the top of the Green Lake Trail. In the area of Green Lake, I was hunting for a notable result on small test slopes and didn't find anything. I dug a quick test bit at 10,700ft on a NE-facing slope. ECTN result under a 70cm F to 1F slab. I later noticed that the 2/2 SH was lying flat in this location. There were some old snow-covered tracks in this area so perhaps it had already collapsed. In one other spot, isolated compared to the terrain traveled, I did finally get some shooting crack on the 2/2 interface. Once I was on top of Mt Axtell I remotely triggered a steep convex slope. That avalanche had a 75cm slab that was F to 1F hard over 8mm SH. While the slope was steep, the crown notably pulled back to a 28-degree slope angle on the ridge. Climbing up to Mt Axtell I remotely triggered two small soft slabs running on the 2/13 crust. The interesting part is that those avalanches were remotely triggered. Otherwise, they were small, didn't propagate far, and ran on top of the crust.

Avalanche

I remotely triggered a large avalanche on a northeast-facing slope of Mt Axtell. Remotely triggered two small storm slabs on south and southeast-facing slopes.